I'm
writing to solicit your help with a time-sensitive matter: As of July 2017,
Indiana University's Media School has drastically decreased the operating the
budget of the Black Film Center/Archive (BFC/A). Established in 1981, the
center/archive has been an incredible and important resource for the
preservation and study of the tradition of filmmaking and new media in the
African Diaspora. Dr. Michael Martin, the director of the BFA/C, who also
produces the center's scholarly journal Black Camera, An International
Journal, has resigned as a result of the budget cuts, which include the
total dissolution of funding for the journal.

In addition to these facts, the following BFC/A programs and
services are likely on the line:

·Further investment
in interdisciplinary collaborations with campus units. Past
BFC/A events have been co-sponsored with the following programs and
institutions: IU Cinema, Cinema and Media Studies, Institute for Advanced
Study, Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies, African Studies
Program, to name a few.

For these reasons, I ask that you Sign your name on
this Google form urging the University to reverse these cuts and preserve the
integrity of the Center. I've signed the list, along with many other artists,
curators, and scholars. As the list grows, it has become important to accrue
names that point to the reach of the center and its impact, and how this type
of de-funding effects both negatively effects the profile of IU, as well as the
wider community committed to the study of the media production of the African
Diaspora.

Finally, on a personal note, the BFC/A has been an incredible
source of community, programming, and resources for my own research and my
classes/students, even within just my first year of being in
Bloomington. If you feel so moved, please sign your name in support of
reversing the university's decision to cut funding for the BFA/C, and spread
this google form among your networks. Thanks so much!

Very best,

Faye

Faye R.
Gleisser

Assistant Professor of Contemporary Art

Indiana University Art History

Radio/TV Building 333

1229 E. Seventh St.

Bloomington, IN 47405

Aaisha Haykal

Manager of Archival
Services

Avery Research Center

College of Charleston

University of Illinois
at Urbana-Champaign
Master's of Science in Library and Information Science, specialization in Community
Informatics, 2011
BA African American Studies, Syracuse University, 2009
BA English and Textual Studies, Syracuse University, 2009